Just got back from my first time to ride the Red River Rally in Sherman. I was very impressed with the organization of the rally and the support, and shocked at the low attendance.

As far as the ride goes, I’ve only done a couple other rallies, but the road conditions, traffic conditions and the route itself were pretty ideal. Not all intersections were blocked off at the end – but hey, not everyone can stop everything just because there’s a bike rally. The traffic conditions were great – being more rural, there was not much traffic, even on the more major streets. I knew the route was supposed to have some hills, but was actually shocked at the amount of climbing. My computer tallied up just over 3,000 feet in total ascent, and while many of the rolling hills were a max of 4-5% grade, there were a couple over 10% that snuck up!

Rest stops were well supported – but one improvement would be to have marked them on the map ahead of time. Hard to plan whether to stop or not when you don’t know how far the next one is. All the stops I made had plenty of water and gatorade, and those with food and snacks had plenty for everyone (at least when I was there).

I headed out and stuck with the lead pack for the 60mile until about mile 8, after a few rolling climbs. I fell off their pace, and then was pretty much completely solo the rest of the ride. The low attendance and great support makes this a no brainer if your cycling group/club wants their own personal supported group ride! I’m a bit disappointed in my average speed, just barely 17mph. Since so much of the route was done solo – it was easy to zone out and go slow without realizing it. Well, that and it was a sunny day that was over 100. That might have something to do with it, too.

Okay, I admit it. I am a nerd. In the Star Wars vs. Star Trek thing, I’ve always been a Trekkie at heart. I love the corny original series and the movies, the next generation was fun even though their movies weren’t great – and I was even sad and forlorn when enterprise didn’t get renewed.

Now THIS looks cool!! If you haven’t seen the trailers or heard about it yet – there’s a new Star Trek movie headed our way in mid-2009. It’s a prequel – and from the trailers it looks like it’s going to fun! Check it out at the Star Trek movie website (IMDB, too).

Should be good (I hope) – It’s got Zachary Quinto (the bad guy Sylar from Heroes) as Spock, and Simon Pegg (the funny guy from Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead) as Scotty. And a sign it can’t be all that bad – the real Spock (a.k.a. Leonard Nimoy) is actually in it too, as himself (er… I mean Spock).

Okay, the economy sucks. You don’t really need an app on your phone to tell you that. Let’s just pretend, for the moment, that the economy was doing better – and therefore the stock market was something that you might actually want to keep tabs on (without an alcoholic beverage in your hand to lessen the blow). Okay, so we’re having our group hallucination now – let’s take it one step further and just imagine you’re an Ameritrade customer.

Ah hah – if that’s true, you should get this app. There’s some good stock tracking programs out there, and the iPhone even comes with one (I personally like the Bloomberg app), but these apps don’t integrate with your trading account. iStockManager does – it integrates with your Ameritrade account. If you have half a brain, you’d be a bit worried and leery about sharing your login information for a financial institution with an application – in this case, no worries – it really is a partner application with TD Ameritrade.

While it will remember your account login ID and password – it will require verification of the password to execute trades – so if someone jacks your iPhone, they’ll only know your account ID (not password), and be able to see what positions you hold, and just how lousy your portfolio is doing. By the way, if your portfolio isn’t doing poorly, please drop me a line and tell me what the hell your secret is. Read on for more details…

If you’re like me, there are some games from your youth that just never get old. Monopoly – Oh yeah, that gets old REAL quick. Risk was one of those games that just never got old. Something about world domination just can’t help but stir something in the heart of every young boy. It even got better as time went on, with more refined and detailed board games like Axis & Allies. Ah, those were the days!

Well, now you can relive just a bit of that fun on your iPhone – and you can even do it for free! The app Lux Touch isn’t as detailed as Axis & Allies – it’s more like a short, sweet version of Risk.

First off, you’re the Blue army – and the object is simple: absolute, complete obliteration of your opponents. At the beginning of each turn, you get armies to add to your existing forces in any area you occupy, and as you gain control of entire continents, you get bonus armies to deploy. As your numbers build up, you can attack adjoining areas that your opponents occupy, and they will attempt to do the same to you. It’s simple, yet addictive. Read on for more and some screenshots…

Who doesn’t like Geocaching?? Well, okay – who doesn’t know what Geocaching is? Okay, one more time – Who knows what Geocaching is?? Well, for those of you who partake, here’s an app for your iPhone straight from the source of geocaching – groundspeak themselves.

Unlike much of the apps that I play with and have written about, this one isn’t free. But, neither was your iPhone, so I suppose paying for an app here and there isn’t as bad as it seems. First off, for those who don’t know what Geocaching is, it’s what those people are doing walking around in zig zags or circles in the park or off to the side of the nature trail. And you just thought they were crazy! Well, actually come to think of it – I have seen a lot of crazy people in remote spots while I’ve been out geocaching, so let’s reserve hasty judgement. In short, someone hides something (a box, an ammo can, even sometimes just a 35mm film container), records the location, and posts it to the geocaching.com website. Then people download the geocache information, grab their GPS and head off in search of it.

Sounds simple – but the fun is trying to hide them in spots that are hard to find (obviously), remote, hard or a long walk to get to – or best yet, a hard to get to, remote spot that’s somewhere pretty, relaxing and seldom visited. Okay, that’s a lot to hope for on each one – but it is fun to head out and try to find them. For those interested, there are Geocaches spread all over the world nowadays, so if you’re interested in getting into it, chances are there are plenty to find where you are. It’s also quite fun with kids – as many of the caches contain little trinkets for trade – just the sort of cheap stuff kids love to find on a ‘treasure hunt’.

So now that you know all about geocaching, what’s this app all about? Read on for more…

Ever find yourself talking with someone about TV shows? If so, I bet you’ve been told about some great that new show that your buddy knows you’d just love. But in this day of Tivos and DVRs, who the heck knows what comes on when – or even what channel! Well, this app can help out with that situation, and provide a lot more to boot.

The app is i.TV – which makes you instantly think it’s a TV Guide for your iPhone. Well, you’d be right. At least, that’s a big part of it. To begin with, you can let the program determine your location – or enter your zipcode to find your local Television options. It’s not limited to just the ‘over the air’ stuff, it can get the appropriate channels and listings for your area for Cable and Satellite providers as well. Once you download those big lists of channels – you run into the same problem you have on your Tivo or DVR – How to get rid of all those channels you don’t care about?

Well, this little app has a bevy of customization features – you can hide channels you’re not interested in, so you can trim down that long list to stations that really matter. From there, that might not help locate that killer show your friend was talking about, so once the listing information has downloaded (which it does automatically), you can search the guide – either what’s on now, what’s on today, or all the info it has. Okay, so that’s handy – you’re interested now. But heck, that’s just the beginning. Read on for more…

So now that the wife has had an iPhone for some time, and I’ve had some time to mess about with it – decision time has come to determine whether or not I will jump ship from Windows Mobile to the iPhone (or at least jump ship for a few months, hehe).

I tend to be a thoughtful person when it comes to decisions, and have posted a couple times on my impressions of the iPhone (here and here). On the whole, the iPhone isn’t perfect, but it’s not a bad choice, either. Right this second, there’s not really any competition to the iPhone. However, around the corner always lurks new technology. There’s bound to be something in the pipe to kill the iPhone’s current prominence as the best all-around mobile device, right? Of course! Read on for more…

Here’s another nifty app for your iPhone. Scribular is a mashing of the ability to get on the Internet with your handy device, and the ability to know where you are with the GPS.

So what’s new or interesting about that? I’m sure there’s hundreds of apps that will show you what’s around close to you like where to eat, drink, etc. Well, sure – this could do that too, but it doesn’t really. What it does do is allow you to see ‘places’ that other folks have designated, and read notes that others have left about those places. The idea is really cool – like a virtual bulletin board for general rants, suggestions, comments or what have you about specific places. Read on for more…